But ornaments don't, so please remove them before recycling

03:51 PM CST on Monday, December 26, 2005

By KATIE MENZER / The Dallas Morning News

It's hard to stay chipper when the when the wood chipper is spitting out flying shards of glass and mangled nails.

That's the post-holiday word from your friendly, neighborhood sanitation and recycling departments, which are asking North Texas residents to please partake of their Christmas tree recycling programs but not before removing all stands, tinsel, lights, nails and ornaments.

Although Christmas tree recycling programs differ from city to city, most transform the Tannenbaums to mulch, which is either offered to residents for free, used on city property or sold. But officials warn that your favorite Christmas bulbs can morph into red-and-green bullets if left on a tree while a worker is putting it through a chipping machine, and ornaments may contaminate the mulch, possibly injuring those who use it in their gardens or elsewhere.

"You don't want people having all that stuff mixed up in their chips," said Duncanville solid waste supervisor David McBurnett, adding that trees left still bedecked by residents at the city's service center – which will begin mulching trees free of charge today – must be thrown away.

The recycling programs are popular among North Texas areas wanting to keep Christmas trees out of valuable space in landfills, but cities including Duncanville, Plano and Dallas said they've seen the forest of trees recycled in their programs thin over the years as more homes go artificial for the holidays.

Duncanville mulched 110 holiday pines in its recycling program last year, down from a high of about 300 in years past. Dallas ground about 4,000 trees last year, which was also down from previous years, officials said.

"About three years ago, they came out with those self-lighted, artificial trees," said Glenna Brown, Plano's recycling education coordinator. "People love those."

Still, if you've gone green this year, Ms. Brown wants you to know you've got a friend in Plano. Homeowners can begin recycling trees – stripped of ornaments – Jan. 3.

The trees will be mulched and sold to residents and companies as Plano Pure compost products.

"They are turned back into a useful product," Ms. Brown said. "Cedar mulch is absolutely divine."

E-mail kmenzer@dallasnews.com

To find out whether your city has a Christmas tree recycling program, try visiting the city's Web site or call the sanitation department. Or check out timetorecycle.com, a regional recycling information center that lists many cities' recycling programs.

Dallas Sanitation Services is accepting live trees for recycling into mulch at several locations, beginning today. Hours are 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. through Jan. 11.

Residents are asked to remove ornaments, nails and stands from the trees.

Disposal sites are Flagpole Hill at Buckner Boulevard and Northwest Highway; Northwest Transfer Station, 9500 Harry Hines Blvd.; Southwest Transfer Station, 4610 S. Westmoreland Road; McCommas Bluff Landfill, 5100 Youngblood Road; and the Fair Oaks Transfer Station, 7677 Fair Oaks Ave. The McCommas landfill is not open for drop-offs on Sunday.

Free mulch is available to Dallas residents at the Northwest station and McCommas landfill after Jan. 1. Proof of residency is required. Bring a shovel to load mulch.